Suburban Areas See An Epic Increase In Home Sales
Areas in the Northeast, such as Connecticut, have seen a huge migration, from heavily populated urban centers like New York City and Boston to more suburban and rural environments. With the daily commute seemingly a thing of the past, and workers having the flexibility to work from home some of the time, the distance between home and work has been ‘extended’. A two- or two-and-a-half-hour commute into the city is doable if it only has to be done once per week.
In South Florida, with its lack of land, what we’ve experienced through the pandemic is a flight to single-family homes. This is true at all price points. For example, by mid-March 2021, the overall inventory of single-family homes under $1 million in Miami-Dade County had shrunk to 1.9 months of supply, versus 5.0 months of inventory at the same time in 2020, just before the pandemic. For the same periods, the months of supply for homes in excess of $1 million fell from 22.1 months to 5.1 months. A healthy market is 6-9 months of available inventory for properties priced under $1 million and 12-18 months for the million-dollar-plus markets.
The median sold price for a single-family home in Miami-Dade for the first 2 1/2 months 2020 was $373,000. For the same time period in 2021, the median price increased to $470,000. Dramatic increase of 26%.
The trend is slightly more compelling in Broward for the first 2 1/2 months of 2021. The supply of single-family homes under $1 million during this period was down to 1.1 months in 2021, compared with 3.3 months a year earlier. The supply for the over $1 million markets was 4.9 months in 2021 versus 15.2 months in 2020. The median sold price for all Broward prices in mid-March 2021 was $430,000, from $379,000 one year earlier, up 13.5%.
We will continue to see a great deal of interest in single-family homes throughout 2021 at all price points. The challenge will continue to be maintaining sufficient inventory to keep a check on double-digit elevating prices.